Games Emerge Conference: Pakistan’s First Game Conference Coming In December

Pakistan’s first gaming conference, Games Emerge Conference (GEC), is scheduled to take place this coming December in Islamabad, with a handful of game industry veterans attending the conference.

The conference is designed to promote video game development in Pakistan. The GEC will run for three days and will include industry talks, workshops, networking opportunities, and a two-day game jam.

The event is being held by Sadia Bashir, the founder and CEO of the PixelArt Games Academy (PGA). PGA is the first ever institute in Pakistan to provide specialized education and training for game development. PGA is partly funded by Pakistan Center, which is funded by US State Department.

Other PGA leaders include Irrational Games co-founders Ken Levine, who is known for Bioshock franchise, and Jonathan Chey, former Ubisoft Montreal AI programmer Brie Code. According to Levine:

I can’t wait to see what the academy grows into. I can’t wait to meet the people who will get involved in the academy and I can’t wait to see the product they are eventually going to create.

PGA aims to support and train for entrepreneurial women. According to Sadia Bashir, the only thing that stopping the growth of game development in Pakistan is the lack of relevant education, and PGA aims to overcome these barriers.

The biggest barrier to the growth of Pakistan’s video game development industry is the lack of relevant education and awareness regarding the development of video games. PGA aims to overcome the educational deficit in the video games sector of Pakistan over the next decade but in order to attract sufficient pool of talent we believe events like GEC 2016 are necessary for creating awareness.

Games Emerge Conference will start on December 2nd and will continue until December 4th.